Today is June 25th and I hope this year, given the international tensions all around us, we pause and consider that today is not just another day but the 59th anniversary of the start of the Korean War.
When the 300,000 troops of the North Korean People’s Army supported by tanks and artillery violently smashed across the 38th parallel to invade and overrun most of the South, they unleashed a conflagration that would grow to be a three year bloodbath pitting the forces of Communism and the Western Democracies against each other for the first time. (It would also be the first time that the nascent United Nations would commit military forces to halt the aggression of one nation against another, showing that the UN must be backed by military will to be effective.) After initial see-saw fighting down to Pusan, then up to the Yalu River after the Inchon landings, and then back down again after the massive Chinese intervention, the fighting settled into a brutal stalemate along a line that eventually would mimic the original pre-war border. When the fighting finally ended in July 1953, the war left in its wake four million military and civilian casualties, including 34,000 American dead and another 100,000 wounded. South Korea would suffer almost 1 million casualties, the other UN nations a combined 17,000 as well. An estimated 520,000 North Koreans and another 900,000 Chinese were casualties.
One of the wounded from that war was a young Second Lieutenant Jack Schaeffer from the 1st US Marine Division, my father. Though he physically recovered from his wounds, he would spend the rest of his life dealing with bouts of depression which, though he never admitted it, I am convinced were the direct result of his experiences in that savage conflict. In his more reflective moments, usually after a pint or three, he would tell me bits and pieces of what he saw and did there. Needless to say, they were disturbing. And one thing I think always went through his mind was this: was the sacrifice made by him and his fellow soldiers worth it?
I think the events a few weeks back regarding the sentencing by North Korea of two American journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, to twelve years hard labor for “illegal entry” would provide some comfort to my dad as to what his suffering meant. The tragic fate of these two women is indicative of the horrors that 23 million North Koreans are forced to endure every day. I will not get into the nitty-gritty of the starvation, exposure, poor health conditions, the physical and mental abuse, the slave labor camps, and general privations these isolated people suffer as this has been well-documented. But I will say that if there was ever a place that resembled Tolkien’s Mordor on this earth, North Korea would be a frigid contender.
When you compare this dismal picture with the vibrant and modern South, the true value of the Allies’ intervention in 1950 reveals itself. Again, I could list all of South Korea’s accomplishments, including its economic prowess, its high standard of living, its relatively free and open society and juxtapose that against the hermit kingdom north of the DMZ but I think this famous satellite photo says it all:
Guess where South Korea ends and North Korea begins? Enough said.
So here then in black-and-white is the legacy of the US-led military action to stave off flagrant communist aggression and protect a vibrant society so that it could develop unmolested by those in Pyongyang who would like nothing more than bring them under their control by force. Like all wars, the Korean War had its ugly moments, but the overall value of our actions, and the service we performed for humanity cannot be denied. There are in fact 48 million people living in sunlight today thanks to men like my father.
I will be honest when I say I have no idea how Obama should handle the journalists’ captivity. This is but the latest of bizarre tantrums on the part of Kim to get noticed. Nuclear tests, cancelling the 1953 armistice technically making him at war with the UN again firing missiles. And now this very public sentencing of these reporters. He wants something. But what he wants, no one can say. It’s hard to read the mind of a sexually deviant power-mad lunatic. Despite Robert Gibbs’ ludicrous statement that “[The journalists’] detainment is not something that we’ve linked to other issues, and we hope the North Koreans don’t do that, either,”this is clearly a test of this administration’s will. I do not envy Obama on this one. We do not wield that kind of power in the region any more. And the sad reality is that without Chinese intercession there is little he can really do. Given that the Chinese like having a buffer between Manchuria and the free nations, especially Japan — cynically condemning millions of innocents to hell on earth to protect their selfish aims — do not hold your breath waiting for their help. (The Chinese government is hardly sympathetic to journalists anyway which is another strike against these poor women). So here we find an example of where the rubber of Obama’s sense of his ability to use his charisma as a foreign policy tool, meets the road of the reality that it is a dangerous world in which not all leaders want what we want… and in fact care little for our way or life or human rights as a whole. The President seems to be operating under the impression that international conflicts are mere “misunderstandings” and that if we talk it out, we will get back to a harmony that he believes is the natural state between nations. Unfortunately, as today’s anniversary shows us, history teaches otherwise. It is best our leader remember this going forward.
I sincerely wish Mr. Obama luck on North Korea. This is a tough one and if he is not sure exactly how to proceed, it’s understandable. Only Kim knows Kim. All I would ask is for him to really consider the nature of the despots he is trying to engage. It would help him in this end to reflect upon what South Korea would look like today if the United States had not stepped in fifty-nine years ago and shed its blood and treasure to keep that nation free of the yolk of communist oppression that so torments the people of the North today. If he takes anything constructive away from the plight of the two unfortunate women now presumably languishing in a North Korean labor camp, it is that he is witnessing first hand the misery that great swaths of the world would be subjected to without our imprint. And I would like him to admit just once that no other nation in history has sacrificed so much for the benefit of others. Maybe the next time he embarks on one of his Apologia Americana tours, he might first fly at night over the sprawling city of Seoul with its skyscrapers, bright lights, vibrant colorful streets and teeming masses of free people and then cast his eyes northward to peer into the dark void in the gloomy distance. Perhaps then he may reflect upon the fact that the United States made this contrast possible. That the country whose standard he now bears has done a lot of good in the world. And that proud Americans like Lt. Jack Schaeffer, USMC, have left the gift of freedom and prosperity as their legacy, giving meaning to their grim suffering far from home, in a foreign land for people they never knew.
45 responses so far
1 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 5:38 am
Yes I think it was worth it. Despite ending as a draw it saved South Korea being subsumed in fifty plus years of awful tyranny. The war was always totally different in character from that in Vietnam although people sometimes claim similarities.
2 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 5:48 am
It is ironic that it is sometimes (though maybe not so much anymore) referred to as “The Forgotten War” considering it had a more lasting effect in terms of keeping people free and defeating communism…even if it was draw.
I think the Chinese attack on the UN forces that drove them back south was one of the greatest human rights crimes of the 20th century. How much better off woul the North Koreans been today if we’d unifed them back in 1950. What a tragedy that Chinese go unchallenged on.
Does anyone think we really would have gone farther than the Yalu? And what more of a buffer does China need than Manchuria and its huge rugged land mass?
China could end the suffering of the North tomorrow if it so pleased. They don’t. That should say alot about who their leaders really are at their core.
Schaeffer was right to point that out when he mentions Chinses cynicism condemning millions. I have rarely heard that pointed out.
As usual, his comments are intelligent and well-drafted.
3 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 6:17 am
“think the Chinese attack on the UN forces that drove them back south was one of the greatest human rights crimes of the 20th century. How much better off woul the North Koreans been today if we’d unifed them back in 1950. What a tragedy that Chinese go unchallenged on.”
…….It wasn’t a human rights crime it was realpolitik…..Their intervention was provoked by crossing the 49th Parallel which MacArthur did despite warnings of Chinese involvement which he pooh poohed…..Once they were in the current outcome was more or less inevitable.
4 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 6:26 am
“provoked by crossing the 49th Parallel”
………..Oops senior moment it’s the 38th Parallel of course…..must have been thinking of that old movie.
5 sinz54 // Jun 25, 2009 at 7:19 am
ottovbvs: Truman was Commander-in-Chief, ultimately responsible for the forces under his command. In October 1950, Truman flew out to meet with MacArthur. MacArthur told Truman that Chinese intervention was unlikely–and Truman agreed, dismissing the Chinese threats as “blackmail.”
Both Truman and MacArthur miscalculated badly.
6 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 7:24 am
You think the peopel starving to death in North Korea think to themselves…”ah this isn’t a crime…it’s just realpolitik! Oh that’s ok then. I sure am hungry though. You gonna eat that rat?”
We can make such sophistical in the West with full bellies can’t we?
7 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 7:31 am
At Wake Island Turman asked MacArthur the likelihood of Chinese intervention and his response was “very little” siting that it would be a bloodletting for them (which it was anyway). But that was a question for the State Dept. to answer, not MacArthur.
And remember, it was a UN resolution to unify Korea that MacArthur followed…he did not go in all renegade like had specific instructions to move north of the parallel by them. Later, when the Chinese attacked and all hell broke loose–and MacArthur’s tactical commanding was very flawed as he left a huge gap between the Eighth Army and X Corps, he was justifiably ridiculed for being completely fooled by the Chicoms. But his decision to enter N. Korea was not his alone. Even though Truman tried to dump it on his shoulders after the fact.
8 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 11:36 am
sinz54
7:19 AM
……..Since MacArthur was Truman’s principal military advisor in the matter and had god like status at the time its not really surprising Truman took his advice…..he didn’t make the same mistake a second time. It took enormous guts to fire god.
9 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 11:39 am
Jeffryw
7:24 AMYou think the peopel starving to death in North Korea think to themselves…”ah this isn’t a crime…it’s just realpolitik! Oh that’s ok then. I sure am hungry though. You gonna eat that rat?”
……..I don’t suppose they do but it doesn’t alter the fact that Chinese entry into the Korean war was based on realpolitik and once it had happened there was no practical way of stopping them short of nuclear war. You’re mixing up emotion and facts on the ground.
10 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Otto.
I am not mixing the two at all. I know the reasons behind the Red Chinese attack. But just because the motive was not specifically to cause pain and suffering on the North Koreans but rather to get the UN away from the border, the pain and suffering happened nonetheless. A consequence they had to know would occur…they just didn’t care one way or the other. Thus is it a crime against humanity.
If I am driving and someone is in my way and they won’t move over and I need to get somewhere and so I run them off the road and into a ditch and they died, I could always say: “well my motive was to get the car in front of me out of the way. Whether or not the driving got killed was of little concern to me one way or the other.”
Does that then not make it a crime?
Again, we speak in sophistry here in the West because we cannot even begin to fathom the sufferings of the people in NK.
Realpolitik is not a free pass for mass murder…which is what the Chicoms by their actions, motives aside, condemned those poor people to when they kicked who could have been their saviors and keys to a better life, the UN, back down to Seoul and re-installed the brutal Kim Il Sung as their overlord and tin horn tyrant.
11 KL7212 // Jun 25, 2009 at 2:12 pm
>>Yes I think it was worth it. Despite ending as a draw it saved South Korea being subsumed in fifty plus years of awful tyranny. The war was always totally different in character from that in Vietnam although people sometimes claim similarities.
I mostly agree with this assessment, but I’d go a little further and say that we won, although I don’t think that was apparent until decades after the “hot” part of the war ended.
North Korea is economic basket case. The country is arguably the world’s most oppressive dictatorship.
Though it remains hermetically sealed from the outside world, it’s pretty clear that North Korea’s way–a hardcore Asiatic Stalinist, “Socialism in One Country”–is a near complete failure. Given the choice, no government in its right mind would model their economy and system of government on the PRK’s.
Meanwhile, the South below the 38th parallel is a prosperous, vibrant and increasingly democratic nation.
The success of the South is much a vindication of our system of democracy and free enterprise as the failure of the North.
12 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 2:20 pm
KL7212
wrote 2 minutes ago
“I mostly agree with this assessment, but I’d go a little further and say that we won,”
……..We didn’t win……..the Jongs have exerted an awful tyranny over the north of the peninsula for nearly sixty years…..that’s as long as than the Napoleonic Empire and the German Empire combined.
13 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Jeffryw
wrote 3 minutes ago
“they just didn’t care one way or the other. Thus is it a crime against humanity.”
……..Not by their standards…..in 1951 communism was still the light of the world to many people….It took another thirty years to prove it was a bummer…..you totally ignore context……and btw I know the decision to cross the 38th parallel wasn’t MacArthur’s alone……apart from Kennan and a couple of others in the State Dept everyone was for it including Acheson who hated MacArthur’s guts……however, Douglas MacArthur was supposed to be the big far east expert…….and as far as I know Truman never tried to blame him beyond saying the General had dismissed the idea of Chinese intervention which he had…….they both made a strategic misjudgement.
14 KL7212 // Jun 25, 2009 at 2:31 pm
otto:
“I don’t suppose they do but it doesn’t alter the fact that Chinese entry into the Korean war was based on realpolitik…”.
I don’t know. I tend to think it was based on ideology and realpolitik. Mao was maneuvering between Chinese territorial interests and politices with the North Koreans and Stalin.
The opening of the Soviet archives in the 1990’s also revealed that Stalin initially wanted to use Soviet forces in Korea. We can be glad the Chinese were used as his proxies instead. Otherwise, direct Soviet involvement might have resulted in World War III.
Certainly, the likelihood of a Third World War involving nuclear weapons would have been much greater had General MacArthur gotten his way.
We can also be glad that Truman had the will and the integrity to put MacArthur in his place–a subordinate to the CIVILIAN LEADERSHIP of the United State.
15 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 2:44 pm
JeffryW: “they just didn’t care one way or the other. Thus is it a crime against humanity.”
Otto: “Not by their standards…..in 1951 communism was still the light of the world to many people….It took another thirty years to prove it was a bummer…..you totally ignore context.”
So then by your definition slavery in the South was not a crime against humanity because by the standards of the day it was perfectly acceptable yes?
The Germans thought the Jews and Slavs inferior so by their standards there was no immorality in slaughtering them wholesale yes? As one German SS man put it, “does a rat catcher feel guilt over killing rats?”
I understand fully well the context. I also know moral relativism when I see it. And you are applying it here in an intellectual bit of word play that completely belies the truth of the matter. When you invade a country to achieve your own ends, knowing full well that pain, suffering, starvation, torture, rape, mass executions will be the result–and you also push out a force that history has shown could have brought prosperity and enlightenment and comfort to those same people–you are committing a terrible wrong.
The same standards apply to 1950 as 2009. Just like slavery was as wrong in the 1800s, even when it was considered “right” by many,as it would be today.
Morality is not a moving target.
16 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 3:41 pm
Jeffryw
wrote 46 minutes ago
“So then by your definition slavery in the South was not a crime against humanity because by the standards of the day it was perfectly acceptable yes?”
………Basically yes…..in the case of the South the Peculiar Institution just overstayed its welcome by about 30 years…..in the 18th century they broke people on the wheel…barbarous but in the context of the times?…..And no by 1938 in Germany they were supposed to have moved beyond conducting pogroms against the jews which is why the rest of the western world disdained the Nazi regime….it’s all a matter of context.
…..And you’re completely wrong:
“Morality is not a moving target.
……Morality is a moving target why otherwise would the US have fought the second world world war against racist regimes with a segregated army! Applying 2009 morality to 1951, 1901, 1851, 1801, 1751, 1701, 1651, or 1601 mores is absurd.
17 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 3:49 pm
KL7212
2:31 PM
“I don’t know. I tend to think it was based on ideology and realpolitik.”
……..With due respect I think you’re picking pepper out of fly poop. No doubt there was an ideological desire to spread communism but I’m sure the main factor was that China didn’t want a pro US country sitting on it’s borders three years after Mao had taken over China and the US at the time had a “who lost China” mania.
18 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 3:56 pm
Otto:
C.S. Lewis said it best: “We are forced to believe in a real Right and Wrong. People may be sometimes MISTAKEN about them, just as people sometimes get their sums wrong; but they are not a matter of of mere taste and opinion any more than the multiplication table.”
All you are pointing out is hypocrisy. Fine I will be the first to label a man who writes “All Men Are CReated Equal” while he owns slaves a hypocrite. But according to you he is not a hypocrite at all because he truly did not see Black people as “men” by his definition. A rationalization.
But this forces you answer a question. Do you Otto, think that Blacks are people? If you do believe that then how can you defend Jefferson who thought slavery was acceptable? If you do not believe that then you are a racist. Or are you? Are you just in your “context” no less morally inclined than I am?
So if you do believe Blacks are people, the you have no choice but to admit that Jefferson was wrong and that you are, therefore closer to right than he is. Thus there must be a fixed point of absolute morality to get “closer” or “farther” from.
Let me ask you. Who was on a higher moral plane…an abolitionist ferrying slaves to freedom on the underground railroad or an overseer whippin’ the “n*888rs to death cause they’s just animals anyhows”? Or are they both right…even though they lived in the same time? Harriet Beacher Stowe and Jefferson Davis were contemporaries were they not?
Would you like to be a slave? In any time? You are quite glib when discussion the pain of others using sophistry as your mantra.
19 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 4:02 pm
“And no by 1938 in Germany they were supposed to have moved beyond conducting pogroms against the jews which is why the rest of the western world disdained the Nazi regime….it’s all a matter of context.”
But the Germans disdained what it saw as western “Jew-lovers” right back. So who was right? Both of them? 90 million Germans waged war under a dogma that we condemned…Nazism. But Nazism was perfectly acceptable to teh GErmans. So if you were in Germany, racism and disdain for the untermenschen was perfectly acceptable. So it was right. Right?
Or is your definition of morality what the majority thinks at that slice in time. “The rest of the Western world” in your example of Nazism’s condemnation. So if 30 million people believe that slavery is great and 10 million believe that it is wrong, then it is by definition right.
Right?
20 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Jeffryw
wrote 1 minutes ago
C. S. Lewis is irrelevant. The notion that we can hold people who lived 200 or 300 years ago or 2000 years ago to today’s moral standards is utterly absurd…..Of course I think blacks are people but 250 years ago who knows….women weren’t legally people at the time……I think Jefferson was a bit of hypocrite from my 2009 standpoint but I probably wouldn’t have in 1776…..If you want a current example look at the changed attitude to gays that has occurred over the past 50 years…..If someone had suggested gay marriage in 1955 they’d have dismissed as crazy….today if you’re not for gay marriage you’re considered a bigot.
21 ottovbvs // Jun 25, 2009 at 4:16 pm
Jeffryw
wrote 7 minutes ago
“But the Germans disdained what it saw as western “Jew-lovers” right back. So who was right? Both of them? 90 million Germans waged war under a dogma that we condemned…Nazism. But Nazism was perfectly acceptable to teh GErmans”
…….I think we know who was right…….It’s well recognized Germany lost it’s mind for 12 years……and there were actually about 80 million Germans in Greater Germany and not all of them were anti Jewish…..and had they all been aware that the jews were being mass murdered and had they not been scared shitless the Gestapo was going to haul them away had they sheltered Jews I’m sure most of them would not have agreed to the mass murder of the Jews……I’m afraid you’re unbelievably simplistic.
22 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 4:27 pm
Otto: “I think we know who was right…….It’s well recognized Germany lost it’s mind for 12 years.”
Oh? So there IS a right and wrong? So you are casting judgment based on your personal morality then. A white supremacist would think they were perfectly in their right mind Otto. But there are not many of them around. So again it comes down to weight of numbers yes?
So then it is safe to say that the USA practicing slavery “lost its mind” for oh what? Up until January 1863?
Your other arguments duck the fundamental question. Why was German’s conduct ‘wrong”? How can you make that judgment (a correct one of course) without having fist a concrete idea of what right and wrong is? And the moment you do that, you are forced to accept that morality is a constant. And that Germany strayed farther from good than the USA say in WW2. That the Holocaust was a more wrong crime than segregation yes? And if it was more wrong, then the USA was closer to right (if not perfect). But there has to be a solid measure against which to measure how far from or close to “right” you are yes?
So in your world, if I take a man from his family, put him in chains, transport him 4000 miles away (oops, I hope I didn’t get the mileage wrong Otto, like your pedantic observation of 90mm versus 80mm whatever) and force him to work in slavery for the rest of his life it is not wrong so long as it happened in 1823 as opposed to 2009 yes? That is the only measure?
And why is CS Lewis irrelevant? Because you don’t agree with him?
Anyway…so slavery was ok in the 1800s then yes? So when a slave described it as “all midnight forever” it was okay because the white man didn’t know better? But there were some abolitionists who did. They lived together.
So….WHO WAS RIGHT Otto? An abolitionist in 1800 or a slaveholder? (Think carefully)
23 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 4:35 pm
Otto: “I think we know who was right…….It’s well recognized Germany lost it’s mind for 12 years.”
It was well recognized that slavery was the natural order of things 300 years in the colonies too. So by your definition of popular opinion = morality, that was perfectly fine yes?
Or are you going to tell me that slaves somehow were not humans back then?
24 Jeffryw // Jun 25, 2009 at 5:40 pm
Otto: “today if you’re not for gay marriage you’re considered a bigot.”
I am not for gay marriage…neither is the majority in this country. Are we therefore bigots? But how can we be wrong if we are in the majority?
By the way, this is from a German fighter pilot named Heinze Knoke: “I am only one of out of many millions of enthusiastic young people who have absolute faith in Hitler and dedicate ourselves to him without reservation. ‘No need to worry; the Fuehrer will see us through,’ we echoe the thoughts of NINETY MILLION (see that number Otto?) Germans all over the world.”
So, was he wrong? Who are you to judge people in another country in another time there any more than you give a free pass to the slave-holders of old? In Germany, in 1938, as Knoke shows, they were absolutely convinced of their righteousness. Well Otto? Was Heinz Knoke wrong?
25 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 7:15 am
Jeffryw
5:40 PMOtto: “today if you’re not for gay marriage you’re considered a bigot.”
I am not for gay marriage…neither is the majority in this country. Are we therefore bigots? But how can we be wrong if we are in the majority?
………Not necessarily but many would think you are which demonstrates that definitions of morality are hardly fixed and immutable. And btw while there is a narrow majority against gay marriage the country is actually fairly evenly divided and I’ve no doubt in 20 years there will be a comfortable majority for it.
……(see that number Otto?) Rather than the opinions of someone who was a nazi enthusiast as a majority Germans ultimately were (which doesn’t mean they were all in favor of the mass murder of the jews btw) I think I’ll rely on population estimates for Germany, Austria and the Sudetanland which is what constituted the nazi German state at it’s max extent.
” In Germany, in 1938, as Knoke shows, they were absolutely convinced of their righteousness. Well Otto? Was Heinz Knoke wrong? “
……They were clearly wrong but I have enough contact with realilty to understand how Hitler came to power and was regarded as such a success at the time. If Hitler had died in 1938 he would have been perceived as one of the greatest if not the greatest German in history whereas if Churchill had died in 1938 he would have been perceived as a drunken failure. You don’t seem to understand Disraeli’s dictum that timing is all.
26 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 7:24 am
Jeffryw
4:27 PM
So….WHO WAS RIGHT Otto? An abolitionist in 1800 or a slaveholder? (Think carefully)
……..I don’t need to think……I’m inclined to believe I would have been an abolitionist but I’m not stupid enough or puffed up with my own self righteousness to think that who and what I was at the time wouldn’t have had a major influence on my opinions. This is a time in England where the abolitionist movement started btw when you could be transported for stealing a loaf of bread or hung for stealing a sheep. I’m afraid your rather santimonious rationalizations are completely one dimensional and unconnected with historical reality.
27 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 7:33 am
“They were clearly wrong.”
Otto, do you not see that all other arguments notwithstanding, you continue to contradict your own fundamental premise of moral relativism by making such an absolute statement?
Why do you think they were “clearly wrong”? What measurement/standard are you holding them up against to come to this conclusion?
28 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 7:36 am
“……..I don’t need to think……I’m inclined to believe I would have been an abolitionist but I’m not stupid enough or puffed up with my own self righteousness to think that who and what I was at the time wouldn’t have had a major influence on my opinions.”
Again you are not answering the question. Let us say for sake of argument you would have been a die-hard John C. Calhoun slave man. Would have been right or wrong to hold that opinion? If you were right, then abolishionists, who lived at the same time, were then wrong yes? Or were you both right?
And as societies develop we like to think we are more enlightened, but that does not mean that lack of enlightenment means lack of fundamental moral truth any more than just because the ancients were unaware of what stars were (thinking them torches of gods or whatever) did not change the fact that they are flaming balls of superheated fission reactors. Truth is truth. One’s perception of truth does not alter that.
29 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 7:39 am
30 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 7:45 am
You label me sanctimonious because I believe that there is an absolute unchanging Right and Wrong. But sanctimonious means hypocritically pious or devout.
Have I ever said that I am the measure of Right and Wrong? Have I said that I would not have been an overseer if living in a different time? Of course not…you have tossed up a straw man.
What I am saying is that if I WERE a slave-holder I would have been wrong…period…regardless of if society found it acceptable. Either you cannot grasp that basic premise, are afraid to address it as it would force you to recant your moral relativist theory, or you are being purposefully obtuse and intellectually disengenious to save face.
The fact is I am not the arbiter or righteousness any more than I may decide that 2+2=5. But I would like to think that I know intrinsic right and wrong, regardless if I always follow the right path.
And if I say that someone who says 2+2= 4 is anything but wrong I am not being sanctimonious at all.
Please use big words properly if you intend to use them at all. Thanks mate.
31 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:05 am
Jeffryw
wrote 24 minutes ago
“Otto, do you not see that all other arguments notwithstanding, you continue to contradict your own fundamental premise of moral relativism by making such an absolute statement?”
……….Moral relativism had no place in 1938, the modern age, in the persecution and mass murder of the jews……On the other hand in 1800 the picture on slavery was less clear…….Time, place and context is largely if not entirely what shapes definitions of morality……by the 1840’s the age of Calhoun the goal posts had moved………You’re welcome to your belief that definitions of morality are fixed and immutable but I’m not going to hold the ancient Romans to our mores on cruelty to animals or 18th century slave traders to ours on slavery……..They were simply different worlds.
32 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:08 am
Jeffryw
wrote 20 minutes ago”You label me sanctimonious because I believe that there is an absolute unchanging Right and Wrong. But sanctimonious means hypocritically pious or devout.
Have I ever said that I am the measure of Right and Wrong? “
…………..I suggest you re-read…..it’s implicit in most of what you’ve written.
33 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:13 am
Jeffryw
wrote 24 minutes ago
“But sanctimonious means hypocritically pious or devout.”
……….It also means have an hypocritical attachment to righteousness
34 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:15 am
You still are avoiding the central question and I suspect you know it of course. So I will ask you point blank:
Was the Holocaust wrong? Not did people THINK it was wrong. Or right or whatever. But as an absolute moral truth, and unequivocal position, is it intrinsically wrong to herd innocent men, women, and children into gas chambers and poison them to death?
Was slavery wrong? Not did people THINK it was wrong. Or right or whatever. But as an absolute moral truth, and unequivocal position, is it intrinsically wrong to hold others in bondage against their will?
Do not tell me what people thought or where societal norms rested along a certain point on teh historical timeline. I am well aware of this. Just answer the questions.
35 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:16 am
How am I a hypocrite. Please explain?
36 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:31 am
“You’re welcome to your belief that definitions of morality are fixed and immutable but I’m not going to hold the ancient Romans to our mores on cruelty to animals or 18th century slave traders to ours on slavery……..They were simply different worlds.”
I am not blaming them for their immorality any more than I blame someone who has lived in a cave and never been taught math for not knowing their sums. But that does not mean that the laws of math do not exist.
I am simply saying that just as those who thought the earth was flat back in the Middle Ages were wrong, so too is nailing someone to cross.
Unless of course you think the right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness etc did not exist for people before the Enlightenment? So therefore the idea of a Right To Life is invented?
37 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:34 am
“You’re welcome to your belief that definitions of morality are fixed and immutable but I’m not going to hold the ancient Romans to our mores on cruelty to animals or 18th century slave traders to ours on slavery……..They were simply different worlds.”
I am not blaming them for their immorality any more than I blame someone who has lived in a cave and never been taught math for not knowing their sums. But that does not mean that the laws of math do not exist.
I am simply saying that just as those who thought the earth was flat back in the Middle Ages were wrong, so too is nailing someone to cross.
Unless of course you think the right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness etc did not exist for people before the Enlightenment? So therefore the idea of a Right To Life is invented?
38 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 8:38 am
“You’re welcome to your belief that definitions of morality are fixed and immutable but I’m not going to hold the ancient Romans to our mores on cruelty to animals or 18th century slave traders to ours on slavery……..They were simply different worlds.”
I am not blaming them for their immorality any more than I blame someone who has lived in a cave and never been taught math for not knowing their sums. But that does not mean that the laws of math do not exist.
I am simply saying that just as those who thought the earth was flat back in the Middle Ages were wrong, so too is nailing someone to cross.
Unless of course you think the right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness etc did not exist for people before the Enlightenment? So therefore the idea of a Right To Life is invented?
39 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 9:04 am
Jeffryw
wrote 13 minutes ago
“Unless of course you think the right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness etc did not exist for people before the Enlightenment? So therefore the idea of a Right To Life is invented?”
….No need tell us three times…….and it doesn’t matter what we think today, whats matters in this context is what they thought in 1700.
” I am not blaming them for their immorality “
………….But you did…..starting off with the Chinese communists, moving through slave owners, then onto the entire German people without distinction for their complicity in the murder of the jews, then the gay community, then finally back to slave owners.
“How am I a hypocrite. Please explain?”
…………I’ll leave you to work that out for yourself.
40 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 9:17 am
“no need to tell us three times.” Ooookay. So now you’ve just degenrated into picking at an obvious computer glitch as a point of argument. Splendid. The last refuge of a failed argument on the net. Fair nuff. (Sorry…fair “enough”)
And of course you still do not answer my question–not that I expected you would of course. So clever…to yourself I guess.
Anyway since I am not afraid to answer your queries (as you are mine) I will respond to your piint that I am blaming the Chicoms.
You mistake blaming for judging. I will judge that slavery, crucifixion, mass murder of Jews etc is certainly wrong. As did you when you said about Germany “clearly they wre wrong.” But once again, I do not blame them per se. If someone is never tuaght math, I do not BLAME them for offering that 2+2 = 5. They are a product of their environment (in this case lack of proper schooling. In the slave times lack of proper enlightenment for many) But I will certainly judge them as wrong because the rules of math state so.
So now I ask YOU for the umpteenth time: Is there an INTRINSIC right or wrong is it all completely and totally relative…therefore really non-existent at all but just a matter of consensus?
41 Jeffryw // Jun 26, 2009 at 9:20 am
And I am not so bright as you can tell so I would appreciate you telling me how I am a hypocrite. Walk me through it.
42 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 9:43 am
Jeffryw
wrote 14 minutes ago
“You mistake blaming for judging.”
……..For those of us unafflicted by pedantry this is largely a distinction without a difference. In your world the mass murder of the jews is “wrong” but you’re not “blaming” the Nazi regime for this although earlier you clearly held responsible the entire population of 90 million (you made a big thing of the 90 million although it’s actually an incorrect figure) Germans for their crimes.
43 KL7212 // Jun 26, 2009 at 9:43 am
Well, I think it’s pretty clear from history that a significant percentage, maybe even a majority, of the Founders thought that slavery did not belong in the newly formed United States. That doesn’t mean they thought of black Africans as equals. They had a much more hierarchical view of the world than contemporary Americans and were probably more willing to accept the “natural order of things” at least in the social sphere, than we.
Likewise, I think the Communists benefitted a great deal, and not entirely without merit, from their role in the defeat of Fascism. After all, the USSR sacrificed more citizens in WWII than all the other Western Allies combined.
That said, the objections to the Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist state were nearly as strong 60 years ago as they are now. The revelation of the extent of their crimes against their people have only made them stronger since then.
44 ottovbvs // Jun 26, 2009 at 9:44 am
Jeffryw
wrote 23 minutes agoAnd I am not so bright as you
…….That’s quite possibly true judging by the parade of muddled thinking.
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